A lot of people watching the show are also just non-gamers. This illustrates more about the dynamics of streaming services vs their own subscription-based (and not viewing-based) pricing. The ideal case for a streaming service is same as that of a gym - people paying the monthly fee and then not using it at all. If a streaming service has a hit show, it means more streams and higher hosting costs. It only translated into more money if it causes more people to actually subscribe than would otherwise have done so, and for subscription-based services that decision usually isn’t based on one show. Netflix probably still has the most data on this sort of thing and even for them, tracking the “why” of any subscription or cancellation decision is difficult at best.

Plus there are so many weird design decisions, the reasons behind which are “that’s how they did it in dota2”, which did them because “that’s how they did it in the engine Defense of the Ancients was built in”. I have no idea how they’ve been as successful as they have been with such a problematic engine.

I absolutely loved the time I spent on League, I played from beta until mid-season 8 or so. There’s no way in hell I’d start playing again, not just for your reasons but I just don’t have the time to try to catch up on all the released champions and changes.

They should focus more on getting people into their other games, like TFT and LoR. Those are way more accessible and lend themselves well for tie-ins, but I never see any promo for them. LoR is even on life support, but it’s the perfect game for people who are interested in the Runeterra universe and want a laidback 1v1 game.